Sunday, November 15, 2020

Seat Bolster Protectors and Climate Control Button Fix

The 997 GT2 carbon seats I have in the Cayman area really nice but they were definitely not cheap and my biggest concern for any bucket-style seat is the wear on the side bolsters over time. Getting in and out can lead to lots of rubbing against that part of the seat. To avoid this problem, I ordered a set of bolster protectors from Crazy Eddie (https://www.edguardusa.com/). Unlike most aftermarket bolster protectors for seats like Recaro, Eddie makes them fit snugly over the bolster and look like they were part of the seat. It's made of OEM like leather and stitching to match as well.

Crazy Eddie GT2 Carbon Bucket Seat Bolster Protector

The installation is fairly straight forward, you disconnect the seat belt so that you can get it out of the seat hole temporarily while you slip the cover on. It attaches via velcro in the front and on the side then tucks into the crevices of the seat cushion. Once installed you can't even tell it isn't part of the original seat. 

Passenger side bolster protector installed - 11-14-2020

Driver side bolster protector installed - 11-14-2020

Next, I pulled out the climate control unit to finally replace the worn temperature and fan switch buttons. This is a common problem on this generation Boxster/Cayman/911. The rubbery material they put on top of the buttons/switches from the factory disintegrate with use and time. One of the previous owners of my Cayman simply painted over the buttons with blank paint or marker so that it didn't look so bad but I wanted to repair this the right way. I ordered replacement switches made by Uro Parts from Uro Tuning which is the cheapest place for these online. 

Replacement temperature and fan switches. 

Replacing it is straightforward as long as you have a T6 torx screwdriver. Remove the 4 T6 screws holding the front in, then remove all the T6 screws holding the PCB to the front fascia. 

Head Unit with painted temp and fan switches

You then need to use tweezers to help detach the switches from the clips holding them in and then put in the new ones.

Fascia detached from PCB
New switches installed -11-15-2020

This guy's video was very helpful in making sure I was able to get the old switches out with no damage.